May 31, 2024
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The Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board is exploring the feasibility of reducing educational development charges for affordable-housing developers. Pictured here in March 2023 is a homeless encampment, one of many across the city.
Cathie Coward Spectator file photo
Encampments scattered throughout the city. Overflowing shelters. A years-long wait-list for municipal housing.
These are symptoms of a “dire” homelessness problem a coalition of Hamilton non-profits is trying to solve, and they’re asking the city’s public school board to help them address it.
The Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board is exploring the feasibility of reducing educational development charges (EDCs), fees imposed on developers to help schools acquire land to serve a growing population, for certain types of affordable housing — a request from Hamilton is Home, a group of non-profit housing providers.
The request asks for a reduced rate for affordable bachelor and one-bedroom units built by non-profits.
“We know how to end homelessness, and it’s finite, it’s not infinite,” supportive-housing operator Indwell CEO Jeff Neven told trustees at a special board meeting on Monday. “Tonight, what I’m asking you to do is to make a commitment, a commitment to helping to solve homelessness.”
Developers currently pay nearly $3,300 — $1,573 in public and $1,701 in Catholic board fees — per residential dwelling, rates calculated based on criteria, including the anticipated student population growth generated by development.
The Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board is exploring the feasibility of reducing educational development charges for affordable-housing developers.
Cathie Coward Spectator file photo
The current bylaws are set to expire on July 5.
But feasibility and associated risks remain unclear, which prompted the board to pass a motion Monday night asking staff to further explore options.
“The political will is at the table,” said chair Maria Felix Miller. “We just don’t have all of the pieces.”
The “prescriptive” procedure is heavily controlled by provincial legislation, she said.
In order to introduce a different rate for affordable housing, the board would need to determine the number of new students coming from the affordable housing in question, data a consultant has told them doesn’t exist. Organizations, however, say it’s information they already collect.
The motion, put forward by trustee Todd White, asks staff to calculate different rates for two categories, bachelor and one-bedroom units in high-density complexes built by non-profits and all other housing. If they can’t, staff must present rationale and suggested next steps, according to the motion.
“I think the calculation will speak for itself,” White said. “When we get it back we’ll see, ‘Does this work? Is something missing?’ But it’s a step forward.”
Even if it’s legislatively possible, the question of feasibility remains.
This is largely due to a 2019 cap legislated by the Ministry of Education in limiting annual increases to $300 per residential unit a year, which means the board already can’t charge enough to cover anticipated needs. The board currently has a small unfunded amount, which would be expected to grow should it opt for a different rate for some affordable housing.
“We are struggling with the cap, which means that there’s a limit to how much we’ll eventually be able to receive back,” Miller said.
Miller said the board is hoping to better understand how it can be done while mitigating risks, such as exposure to potential legal challenges from developers paying a higher rate and a greater shortfall the board may eventually need for growth-related land needs.
The board’s primary obligation, she said, “is to the health and the sustainability of the system.”
“We want to be careful,” she said. “We already know that we’re not currently funded for everything that we would want in our structure already.”
The consultant said at least one other Ontario school board has considered similar differentiated rates, but none has been successful.
The coalition asked on Monday for reduced rates for bachelor and one-bedroom units, which constitute 64 per cent of planned developments and house few children, resulting in a “very low impact” on student population. This shift from its initial request to be exempt from charges altogether followed weeks of dialogue, said chair Graham Cubitt, who is also director of projects and development for Indwell.
The coalition acknowledged the board would take a financial hit — “the most minimal cost we can calculate,” Cubitt said.
He said they’re pleased for the opportunity to work with school board staff, and plan to help them by sharing a decade of data, including tenant demographics, to help create realistic student estimates for bachelor and one-bedroom apartments.
“It was clear from the protracted deliberations that trustees want to assist allies to address the homelessness crisis facing our community, but they have not yet been equipped to understand the implications,” he said.
The need is great, the coalition contends, and homelessness is a “shared responsibility.”
Funding for housing projects has “dried up,” Neven said, and Indwell relies heavily on fundraising, which takes “exceptional effort and sacrifice by donors.” EDCs add up, he said, especially when building high-density apartment buildings, the organizations’ bread and butter.
“When we’re looking at trying to build 100 units … that’s $350,000 of education development charges,” he told The Spectator.
The requested rate is far more equitable than the existing formula that charges all developers — for- and non-profit — equally, the coalition argues.
“We want great schools,” Neven said. “And we also think that new schools in suburban areas in Binbrook shouldn’t be paid for by dollars intended to solve homelessness.”